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Submission Summary: 0 pending, 4 declined, 6 accepted (10 total, 60.00% accepted)

Submission + - We can move beyond the capitalist model and save the climate (theguardian.com) 4

Submitted by votsalo
votsalo writes: Jason Hickel and Yanis Varoufakis write:

Our existing economic system is incapable of addressing the social and ecological crises we face in the 21st century.

The purpose [of capital] is to maximise and accumulate profit. That is the overriding objective. This is the capitalist law of value.

There are three necessary conditions for the transformation of our economy from a dead-end dictatorship into a functioning and ecologically sound democratic one.

These are their three conditions, epigrammatically:

  1. A new financial architecture
  2. Extensive use of deliberative democracy
  3. Corporate Reform that favours and promotes the formation of companies run along the lines of one employee, one share, one vote.

We live in a shadow of the world we could create. A world in which we shall be able to avert an almost certain ecological collapse, rather than waiting around for capitalism to push us beyond the point of no return. A world where the abolition of economic insecurity, precarity, poverty, unemployment and indignity is possible, while we lead meaningful lives within planetary boundaries. This is not a distant dream. It is a tangible prospect.


Submission + - Remote controlled car rental service (theguardian.com) 3

Submitted by votsalo
votsalo writes: A German company, Vay, offers a rental car service where the cars are driven by a remote driver to the customer, who then takes over driving the car. At the end of the rental, a remote driver takes over again to take the car away. The trained remote drivers sit in a driving station, with a steering wheel, foot pedals, screens, headphones, and even tactile feedback for things like bumps on the road.

Vay says the rental rate cost would be "about half of what a current car-sharing service costs". If he is talking about car-rental services that deliver cars to customers by on-site drivers, like this defunct San Francisco car rental company, then the claim about half the cost seems right.

Vay's founder used Las Vegas as a testing ground for the service, and expects to launch in Germany soon. Las Vegas had the necessary legal framework already in place.

Submission + - He crossed 26 miles in a kayak made from mushrooms (theguardian.com)

Submitted by votsalo
votsalo writes: Sam Shoemaker, who is an MFA graduate from Yale, was fascinated by the mechanical properties of mycelium, a threaded like material produced by fungi, and painstakingly built two cayaks out of it, by growing the material in a mold, and then drying it over several months. The second kayak was good enough to withstand an ocean trip from Los Angeles to Catalina island.

Can mycelium replace plastic or other materials for some uses?

Submission + - Second study finds Uber used opaque algorithm to dramatically boost profits (theguardian.com)

Submitted by votsalo
votsalo writes: Research by academics at New York’s Columbia Business School concluded that [Uber] had implemented “algorithmic price discrimination” that had raised “rider fares and cut driver pay on billions of trips, systematically, selectively, and opaquely”. Their research was based on an analysis of 2 million trip requests, focusing on 24532 trips made by a single US driver.

A similar academic paper by the University of Oxford was based on 1.5m UK trips.

Len Sherman, the US report’s author, said: “Uber says ‘we know more about driver and rider behaviour, so we can figure out who is willing to pay more [as a passenger] or accept less [as a driver].’ I’m in awe of what they have been able to accomplish.”

Submission + - how Cyprus became a world leader in solar heating

Submitted by votsalo
votsalo writes: From the article:

“We do around four installations a day across Cyprus,” says Mihali. “And each takes little more than two hours at most because, like the system itself, it’s all so easy.”

Cyprus has outstripped all other EU member states in embracing hot-water solar systems, with an estimated 93.5 % of households exploiting the alternative energy form for domestic needs.

All you need are solar panels, a tank and copper pipes. Ever since, it’s been a wonderful solution to the hot water needs of households here.”

Submission + - California approved dropping rodenticide on Farallon Islands (sfgate.com) 2

Submitted by votsalo
votsalo writes: The California Coastal Commission approved dropping rodenticide on Farallon Islands.

"The rocky outcrop of sea stacks and islands west of the Golden Gate is home to 300,000 breeding seabirds, as well as five species of seals and sea lions. That unique biodiversity, however, also includes more than 1,000 mice per acre, a population that has exploded in recent years. " The mice "were first introduced by sailors over a century ago."

Dr. Jane Goodall argued against the poison at the hearing, but the Commission decided 5-3 to airdrop 3000 pounds of poison by helicopters.

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